Chapter 7: The Caves Discovery - Part 2
The camp was splitting like a bone under pressure. Mac could see it happening in real time—invisible fractures spreading through their fragile community as people chose sides between Jack's pragmatic cave relocation and Kate's hopeful beach vigil.
Jack had already begun moving medical supplies inland, leading a convoy of volunteers carrying salvaged equipment deeper into the jungle. Half the survivors followed him—the injured who needed shelter, the families with children who craved security, the pragmatists who'd accepted that rescue might never come.
Kate organized the beach resistance with quiet efficiency, rallying those who still believed in salvation from the outside world. They reinforced shelters against storms, improved signal fires, and maintained constant watch on the horizon for ships or planes that might carry them home.
Mac found himself caught between both groups, literally and figuratively. For the past two days, he'd survived on three hours of sleep total, building infrastructure for people who were rapidly becoming strangers to each other.
His body screamed exhaustion, but his hands wouldn't stop moving. The Master Builder power hummed under his skin like electricity, demanding expression through construction and problem-solving. Every time he tried to rest, someone needed shelter repaired or water systems improved or tools crafted from debris.
The beach camp required him. The cave camp required him. And Mac was slowly killing himself trying to serve both masters.
He started the trail system at dawn, working with single-minded determination that bordered on obsession. The project consumed him completely—clearing undergrowth with improvised machetes, laying rope guides at eye level for navigation in poor light, establishing emergency supply caches every quarter mile like breadcrumbs through a fairy tale forest.
His hands moved faster than they should, Phase One building abilities pushing toward something more advanced. Mac could feel the power evolving inside him, responding to constant use and desperate need. What had started as construction knowledge was becoming something approaching architectural genius, allowing him to see structural possibilities that transcended normal human understanding.
"Dude, you're like a one-man construction crew," Hurley observed, arriving with an armload of materials Mac had requested. "Seriously, you've been at this since sunrise. Don't you need to eat or sleep or something?"
Mac paused in his work, realizing he hadn't eaten in almost eighteen hours. His stomach felt hollow, his hands shook slightly from low blood sugar, but the compulsion to build drove him forward regardless of physical needs.
"Just keeping busy," Mac said, accepting a salvaged protein bar from Hurley. "Helps me not think too hard about being stranded on a mysterious island."
Hurley studied Mac's face with concern. "You look like hell, man. Maybe take a break?"
But Mac was already back to work, weaving rope guides through trees with precision that would have impressed a military engineer. The trail he was building wasn't just functional—it was elegant, efficient, designed to handle heavy traffic in all weather conditions while remaining nearly invisible from a distance.
Survivors began using his trail system immediately, moving between camps with ease and safety that hadn't existed before. Mac watched them come and go like blood cells through arteries he'd constructed, and realized with growing unease that he was becoming infrastructure personified.
Both groups needed him now. Neither could function without his constructions connecting them. He'd made himself indispensable to people who were choosing to live apart, which meant his secrets were more vulnerable than ever.
POV: Sawyer
Sawyer Ford had been stockpiling supplies since the second day after the crash—medicine, food, tools, anything that might become valuable when civilization's thin veneer finally cracked completely. He'd learned early in life that people would trade anything when they were desperate enough, and being prepared for that desperation was the difference between survival and becoming someone else's victim.
His cache was hidden in the wreckage of the plane's tail section, concealed among twisted metal and burned plastic where casual searchers wouldn't think to look. Antibiotics from the medical kit, canned food from the galley, rope and tools and electronics that might prove useful. Insurance against the day when cooperation failed and the real survival began.
So when Mac Kerby approached his hiding spot with that knowing look in his eyes, Sawyer's first instinct was to reach for the gun he'd taken from the marshal.
"Saw you moving things earlier," Mac said without preamble. "You're hoarding."
Sawyer waited for the confrontation—the moral lecture about sharing resources, the threats to report him to Jack, the righteous indignation that most people showed when they discovered someone had been thinking ahead.
Instead, Mac just asked, "Can I borrow the rope for trail markers? I'll trade you first pick of fishing spots."
Sawyer blinked, thrown completely off balance. This wasn't how these conversations usually went. People were supposed to be outraged by his pragmatism, not trying to negotiate with it.
"What makes you think I won't just take your fishing spots anyway?" Sawyer asked, testing the waters.
Mac's grin was tired but genuine. "Because you're not actually an asshole, whatever you pretend. You're preparing for worst case scenarios. I get it."
The words hit harder than Sawyer expected. Most people saw him as selfish, greedy, willing to profit from others' misfortune. But Mac was looking at him like someone who recognized a fellow survivor—someone who understood that kindness was a luxury you couldn't afford when resources got scarce.
POV: Mac
Sawyer studied Mac for a long moment, his con man instincts clearly evaluating angles and advantages. Finally, he tossed a coil of rope from his cache.
"You're weird, Bob the Builder," Sawyer said, but there was something approaching respect in his voice. "But I ain't saying no to good fishing spots."
As Mac walked away with the rope, he felt a small knot of tension release in his chest. Building an alliance with Sawyer wasn't just about getting materials—it was about recognizing that everyone on the island was playing survival games with incomplete information.
Sawyer was hoarding supplies because he'd learned not to trust in other people's charity. Mac was building infrastructure because his powers demanded expression and his guilt demanded usefulness. Kate was staying on the beach because running had taught her to always keep escape routes open. Jack was moving to the caves because controlling environments was his way of controlling fear.
Everyone had their strategies for surviving in a world that had stopped making sense.
Mac worked through the evening, using Sawyer's rope to complete his trail marking system. By the time full darkness fell, he'd created a safe passage between the two camps that could be navigated by moonlight or feel alone.
He was adding finishing touches to a rain shelter near the beach when Kate found him. She sat beside his work area without speaking, just watching his hands move with mechanical precision through familiar construction motions.
"You're running yourself into the ground," Kate said finally. "Why?"
Mac's hands never stopped moving, tying knots and adjusting supports with automatic efficiency. "Gives me purpose. Keeps me from thinking too hard about being stranded on a mysterious island with no visible means of rescue."
Kate was quiet for a moment, processing his words. When she spoke again, her voice carried careful neutrality.
"Jack thinks you're trying to make yourself indispensable. Playing both sides so you'll be valuable no matter which group survives."
Mac's hands stilled for just an instant before resuming their work. "What do you think?"
Kate considered the question seriously, her fugitive instincts weighing evidence and motivations with practiced skill.
"I think you actually care," she said slowly. "I think you're trying to help people survive, and you don't see why that means choosing sides."
She paused, then continued with harder truth.
"But I also think you know things you're not sharing. And that makes me nervous."
Mac's heart hammered against his ribs. Kate was getting too close to truths he couldn't reveal—his fragmentary knowledge of future events, his impossible abilities, his fundamental wrongness in this reality.
"Everyone's got secrets, Kate," Mac said carefully. "Even you."
Kate stood to leave, but paused at the edge of his work area.
"The difference is, my secrets could hurt people," she said. "Yours..."
She trailed off, uncertainty flickering across her face as she tried to articulate suspicions she couldn't quite define.
Mac forced himself to meet her eyes. "Mine too. Eventually."
The admission hung between them like a confession. Kate nodded once, as if he'd confirmed something she'd suspected, then disappeared into the darkness.
Mac returned to his construction work, hands shaking slightly as he tied the final supports for what he'd already mentally named "Diplomatic-Relations-Maybe-Stop-Collapse." The shelter was solid, functional, designed to bridge the gap between two camps that were drifting apart like continents.
But Kate's words echoed in his memory. His secrets could hurt people—would hurt people, when the truth inevitably came out. Every day he spent building trust and relationships was another day of lies that would make the eventual revelation more destructive.
"I'm living on borrowed time," Mac realized with crystalline clarity. "Every power I use, every impossible thing I know, every solution I provide that shouldn't be possible—it's all building toward a reckoning I can't avoid. The question isn't whether my secrets will destroy these relationships. The question is whether I can do enough good before that happens to justify the damage."
Mac collapsed in Fort Probably-Won't-Collapse near midnight, his body finally overruling his compulsive need to build. Every muscle ached, his hands were blistered despite his healing abilities, and exhaustion sat on his chest like a physical weight.
But both camps now had shelter, fresh water, and safe passage between them. His trail system had become the arteries that kept their fractured community alive, and his construction work had bought them time to figure out more permanent solutions.
Tomorrow he would rest. Probably. Unless someone needed something built, fixed, or improved. The island had a way of making such necessities unavoidable.
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